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Imgig Zu
| refs1e = | alignment = Chaotic evil | rules = 1st edition }} Imgig Zu was an extraplanar monster and the ruler of his people. History The Song of Selûne Imgig Zu's history was a matter of legend, set down in the Song of Selûne. It began when the wayward young goddess Selûne traveled to another plane and was smitten by a mysterious and attractive warrior, a lord of his people. The stranger persuaded her to use her father's wand of power to transport him and his followers to Toril, where they planned to settle. However, once they landed, he revealed his true form and intentions—he was the monstrous Imgig Zu and he and his people were intent on conquest and ruin. He seized her father's wand of power and intended to kill the deceived goddess. Fortunately, a brave young wizard named Ostus Agrivar who was riding by raced to her rescue. Although the wizard was not powerful enough to defeat the monsters, he was capable of causing enough confusion and chaos that Selûne could escape. The goddess, now freed from her subjugation, used the only thing she had left: her own life force. Draining her life force away, she imprisoned the monsters inside a pocket dimension within a gigantic moonstone, which should contain them for all time. She reduced the gem, now known as Selûne's Eye, in size and gave it to Ostus for safe keeping. Escape However, from inside the gem, Imgig Zu somehow managed to observe a shamanic rite in which the elves of Shadowdale extracted a dark spirit from the infant Cybriana, daughter of Ostus Agrivar. Imgig watched as the dark spirit transformed itself into a living being, an evil drow woman who took the name "Kilili". Imgig forged a magical link with Kilili, which allowed him to escape into the Realms. However, he needed Cybriana and Kilili together to release the rest of his people from Selûne's Eye. Kilili fell in with Imgig, and together they hatched their scheme. Imgig Zu once forcibly transported the fire elemental Jogaoh from his home plane to the world of Toril. Employing a Lockstone, Imgig then trapped the powerful fire elemental in the form of a weak dwarf, which in turn bound him to Toril, and furthermore used his staff of withering to drain the strength from Jogaoh's limbs. Nevertheless, Jogaoh was able to escape. Thus, Imgig placed the Lockstone atop Stoner's Needle in the Sword Coast lands with a frozen greater basilisk as guardian. The Lockstone also proved the key to Jogaoh's release. Its conditions were the passing of two centuries and to be touched by a living creature. Once these were met, it would restore withered or lost limbs to the one who touched it and transform them back to their original form, but also awake the greater basilisk guardian. Jogaoh feared the basilisk too much to make the climb up and take the Lockstone. The conditions of the Lockstone imply this took place at least two centuries prior to 1357 DR, so some time before 1157 DR. However, the young age of Cybriana suggests a much more recent escape for Imgig. Imgig may have trapped Jogaoh some time prior to coming to Toril. The Great Awakening In the Year of the Dragon, 1352 DR, riding a wyvern, Imgig Zu broke through the wall and magical defenses of Ostus's Hold and attacked the aged Ostus Agrivar and his son Priam. Imgig crippled Priam with the staff of withering and slew Ostus with a death spell. Then he seized the Selûne's Eye and left, mocking Priam for his crippled state and inability to threaten him. However, some six years later, Imgig Zu was yet unable to use the Eye. By this time, he and Kilili had joined forces with a yuan-ti, gargoyles, ogres, and a number of chasme minions. In one day in the Year of the Prince, 1357 DR, Imgig Zu erected a magical tower a day's ride north of Waterdeep, and had his yuan-ti and chasme minions find and kidnap female elven magic-users as he sought out Cybriana. Imgig Zu had determined that it was Kilili's own "sister", Cybriana, whose very presence could make Selûne's Eye glow like the moon. Kilili had her sport with those that were brought back, testing their power in magical combat and dispatching them with ease until she found her counterpart. The chasme brought back Jalma and two other elf women, but failed to capture Cybriana, with three killed in the process. For their failure and deaths, Imgig Zu killed the chasme leader. When the City Guard of Waterdeep discovered his tower, Imgig Zu sent his gargoyles to destroy them. Imgig later used magic to contact his kin, who longed for release from Selûne's Eye. Imgig promised that he was close to succeeding and that he would soon release them to overrun Toril, an event he called the Great Awakening. Later, after the chasme had gone hunting for more victims and been destroyed by Cybriana and her companions, Imgig Zu observed Selûne's Eye glow like the moon, meaning that Kilili's sister was near his tower and had been found by the chasme. Kilili visited Cybriana, and lured her toward Imgig's tower. Imgig's gargoyles snatched up Cybriana; when dropped, Kilili rescued her with a ring of telekinesis, and Cybriana was taken into their lair. Her companions, Priam Agrivar, Vajra Valmeyjar, Timoth Eyesbright, and Onyx the Invincible escaped the gargoyles and found other ways in. In the caverns beneath Imgig's tower, Cybriana was placed inside a forcecage as Kilili stood just outside. Their proximity, both to each other and to Selûne's Eye caused the gem to glow even more brightly and to swell in size. He revealed to Cybriana the secret of his connection to Kilili. Proclaiming his triumphs before an audience of his ogre minions, Imgig Zu used the combined powers of the elven women and the stolen wand of power to open the Eye and released his long-imprisoned people into the world, to overrun and conquer the Realms. Meanwhile, Cybriana's companions battled through the ogres and into the cavern, but were ultimately subdued. Imgig gloated, threatening to kill Priam with the same spell of death he'd used to kill Ostus. But, just then, the roof of the cavern tore open and the brilliant light of the full moon—the workings of the goddess Selûne, via her avatar Luna—shone through, blinding the ogres. Cybriana urged her brother Priam to strike, and strike he did, slaying Imgig Zu in the name of their father. At Imgig's death, the forcecage faded, and Cybriana escaped. She grabbed Kilili and the two merged into a single being, the living key to Selûne's Eye. The merged being vanished inside the gem, drawing all of Imgig's people back within, saving the Realms from devastation. Description Imgig's natural form was of a powerfully built humanoid creature, muscular and standing 7.5 feet (2.3 meters) tall. He had scaly gray-green skin, red eyes, and a wide maw full of fangs. His great head bristled with curving horns: two protruded from the top of his head, two from the sides, and two from his jaw either side of his mouth. In the guise of a human-like being, he appeared to Selûne as a darkly handsome man with long black hair. In both forms, he customarily wore a white breastplate, greaves, bracers, and armbands, decorated with curling black designs and red gems in gold settings. Behind, he wore a long green cloak. Personality Imgig Zu possessed a genius intellect, but was cruel, unpredictable, deceitful, and very evil. He had designs on conquest and slaughter. Abilities Imgig Zu commanded the magical powers of a magic-user of middling level. His spells included flesh to stone and stone wall. He also knew a spell of death that could kill a being outright. He also possessed a number of other, separate powers, each usable once a day. With a talent for earth-based magic, Imgig could cast animate (on stone statues), earthquake, move earth, rock to mud, and stone to flesh. He could also shape-change into the form of any humanoid being. Finally, he possessed a slight resistance to magic. However, Imgig seemed to lack any magical ability to travel between planes. Imgig was also incredibly strong. Origins The world or plane that Imgig Zu and his people originated from was unknown, and it may have been an alternate prime material plane, one of the Lower Planes, or a small demi-plane. In the Song of Selûne, Luna (in truth an avatar of Selûne) described it as a plane with a forbidding blood moon palely glowing over a barren land. It was also unknown whether Imgig's people had the same powers he wielded, though they had the same appearance and shape-changing power, and were thought to be just as evil. Possessions Imgig Zu wielded a staff of withering, a powerful staff that could magically age a struck creature, and even leave the struck limbs withered and crippled. He also held the wand of power seized from Selûne, in turn stolen from her father. Relationships Imgig Zu was ruler of a race of people like him. In his plots in the 1350s DR, Imgig worked with Kilili, a drow sorceress and the literal key to his schemes; and a led number of monstrous minion: a squad of chasme fly demons; a yuan-ti who organized the chasme; a wing of gargoyles that guarded his tower; and a legion of ogre warriors that waited in the caverns below. At one time, he also rode a wyvern. Appendix Notes References Category:Males Category:Planewalkers Category:Rulers Category:Inhabitants of Faerûn Category:Inhabitants of Toril Category:Inhabitants of the Great Wheel planes Category:Inhabitants of chaotic evil alignment Category:Inhabitants